


seedlings

by straddling_the_atmosphere



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Fluff, Gardens & Gardening, M/M, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Religious Imagery & Symbolism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-12
Updated: 2021-01-12
Packaged: 2021-03-17 03:15:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,086
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28717920
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/straddling_the_atmosphere/pseuds/straddling_the_atmosphere
Summary: Castiel grows a garden and tells a story.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Comments: 6
Kudos: 35





	seedlings

**Author's Note:**

> posted this on tumblr but thought i'd crosspost here! i love validation in two forms, yk

“We are all creatures of god’s earth,” Castiel says, his hands buried in the damp, cool soil of the garden. Dean watches him, feeling the burn of the sun on his nose. 

“Even you?” he asks and Cas hums.

“Even angels,” Cas replies, gently brushing dirt over exposed roots, patting the ground smooth around the plant. “We were god’s first creation, after the universe. Made in his image, obedient, perfect.” Cas’s skin is brown from the sun, and there’s a sheen of sweat along the back of his neck. He smells like dirt and thunderstorms. He smells human. He smells other.

“And then there were the humans,” he adds. “Made in his image again, but with something angels lacked. Choice.” Dean can tell as Cas speaks that there are no capitalizations, that if there was once God, now he is simply a god. Fallible, imperfect.

“We were supposed to love them,” he continues, his wide hands speckled brown with the soil, the skin stained the color of mud. He wipes a bit of soil from a delicate green leaf with a tenderness that makes Dean’s heart abruptly ache, but he forces himself to keep looking.

“Don’t think the others got the memo,” Dean says and Cas snorts, a soft huff of air.

“In that way I was following god’s orders more than any of the others,” he says, voice soft. He has his fingers curled around the handle of a watering can but he’s paused, looking down at the garden. “I loved all of you, before I knew what that word ever meant. And I think I always had, even if I can’t remember it.”

Dean feels a surge of anger at that, the memories Cas has lost, that he’ll never get back. His bad knee aches from kneeling in the dirt with Cas but he doesn’t move.

“But more than anything, we were supposed to love all of god’s creations.” Cas starts to move again, sprinkling water along the ground, occasionally bending down to let a caterpillar crawl onto him and deposit it elsewhere. “All of the animals--from venomous snakes to gentle dogs, to little caterpillars that will bloom brightly and shortly into butterflies.” He puts the watering can down and runs a finger down the pad of a mushroom, soothed by the velvety softness of it. “The plants too--the basil I grow that you use in your spaghetti sauce, the strawberries that we mix with cream in the summer. Even those that aren’t quite either plants or animals,” he adds, tapping the top of the mushroom gently.

He looks over at Dean. “I used to be able to hear them speak to each other,” he says. “There was so much noise. The angel radio, prayers, fungal systems under the ground communicating to the plants they helped, or to each other. Bees talking to each other as they worked collaboratively in their hives. Wolves howling for the sheer joy of being out in the night sky. I could hear and understand all of it.” Cas closes his eyes at that and Dean swallows, throat dry.

“It’s very quiet now,” he whispers.

“You miss it,” Dean says.

“Of course I do,” Cas replies, opening his eyes again. “I am an angel, Dean, with or without my grace. Being cut off from everything that I am hurts me. That doesn’t mean I regret it.” His voice gentles, like he can hear the way Dean’s heart jolts in panic. He reaches up and Dean goes very still as Cas pulls the chain that Dean always wears around his neck, the little glowing vial hidden underneath his t-shirt.

“When you go, I’ll take this back. I’ll meet you wherever you go, after. I meant it when I gave it to you, and I mean it now.”

Dean lets out a sharp exhale that turns hitched when Cas’s hand cups the side of his neck, warm and big, and Dean can smell him, the human musk of sweating in the sun, the heat of his skin, and underneath that, something that he imagines is what Jimmy called being chained to a comet. The electricity of air before a thunderstorm. It’s a scent that’s never fully left Cas, even after two years like this. 

Cas’s thumb runs down the side of Dean’s throat and Dean leans into the touch, helplessly trusting. “I don’t regret my actions,” he murmurs. “But. This is my body, but it isn’t as well.” Dean nods. He’s been there the mornings that Cas’s shoulders ache, like they should be holding wings that aren’t there. The mornings Cas wakes with a ragged gasp and claws at his skin until Dean takes his hands between his own and makes him breathe with him, until Cas can look at him with clear eyes, and Dean can carefully dab neosporin on the cuts on his arms and wrap them gently in cloth. 

"It is incredible to me,” Cas says after a soft moment. “How strong humanity is. That the only voice they can hear inside their own mind is their own. Sometimes I feel as if I’m going mad, only hearing my own thoughts.”

“Yeah, it’s not all that fun for us either,” Dean says with a snort and Cas gives tilts his head as he looks at him. Dean stares back. It’s been a long time since he’s shied away from Cas’s gaze.

“No,” he murmurs. “I know it isn’t.” He squeezes the side of Dean’s neck gently before dropping his hand, looking down at the garden. “I think I’ve given this enough love today,” he says, and he gets up, helping Dean as well. Dean stretches out his aching knee.

“Hey,” he says, grabbing Cas’s sleeve as Cas starts to head back inside.

Cas turns back to look at him.

“The garden of Eden,” he says. “Did you ever see that?”

Cas smiles, a soft, brittle thing. “I grew it. Before the humans could ever arrive, it had to be created. God began it, of course, but it needed to seed, to flower, to be nourished.” He sighs and he reaches up, plucking an almost ripe apple from the tree above them. “And do you want to know something?” He gives Dean an amused look and he hands him the apple. “The apples were always my favorite.”

Dean watches him as he turns back around and walks inside. He stares down at the apple in his hand, crisp and green and yellow, and he takes a bite. 

**Author's Note:**

> i'm @lennythepope on tumblr. hope you enjoyed!


End file.
